valley twenty-two miles toward San Francisco, and the Anaheim road, twenty-eight miles. Progress had arrived.
From the beginnings of Los Angeles and San Gabriel, San Pedro was the port, but for very many years it remained the desolate spot that is described in “Two Years Before the Mast.” There was one hide house to which, when a boat came into port, the accumulated stores of hides and tallow were hauled. These products which the inhabitants exchanged with Yankee traders for everything they needed or wanted in the way of manufactured goods, did not require very elaborate facilities, and it was the custom to roll the bundles over the cliffs to the rocks below where the sailors must gather them up and carry on their heads out to their boats. The sailors also must carry over the rough trail to the top of the bluff the boxes and bales containing their merchandise. San Pedro was not a popular port. But conditions must have improved very soon after the visits of Dana, for there is extant a letter from the Angeleno of Boston origin, Abel Stearns, in which he tells of his notion to improve the situation. He took up a collection among his friends, to the amount of one hundred and fifty dollars, secured the services of some mission Indians and in a few weeks had made the first road down to water level.
After the admission of California as a state, travel to and from Los Angeles increased and before long stages between San Pedro and the city became necessary. Don David Alexander and General Phineas
